Novel
by AtomicScribble
Summary: Sequel to Writer's Block. Pebbles and co. are under increasing confusion when they find one section of the team absent...and a new challenge to face. [permahiatus?]
1. An Abyss

**WASSUP? It's only been a full year since I published the first installment in this loverly, fantabulous trilogy. XD**

**Strangely, it is set exactly a year into the future. Pretty much no characters have been changed or removed (save for three key ones), so you can just run over to the old Writer's Block to look for character stuffs.**

**Keep in mind that if you dive into the series now, only a bit of it will sound even mildly explained to you. YOU MUST READ THE FIRST WRITER'S BLOCK BEFORE READING THIS ONE. I'm not trying to boost my stats and reviews; I'm trying to reduce the number of "OMG WTF IS HAPPENING AAAAH" reviews I get for this puppy. So have fun. X3**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Phantom of the Opera or Corpse Bride OR the different movie which will be in here. The only characters that are mine are the original characters explained in the first WB installment. I own myself, and all of the other people in the town/school own themselves because they are real people.**

xoxIIxox

_Scuff, scuff, scuff, scuff…_

Pink and black boots shuffled along the bluish-green carpet quietly, their owner not wishing to pick them up. A DDR song whispered from the earphones perched inside sensitive ears, connected to a pink iPod mini sitting inside a brown corduroy coat. Brown eyes scanned over the crowd of 6th, 7th, and 8th graders rushing past her, chatting aimlessly about nothing.

The girl sighed tiredly, suppressing a large, long yawn as she fingered a shimmery orange pumpkin dangling from a matching orange chain around her neck. Another Monday, another long line of schoolwork, questions about where she got that unusual necklace of hers…

Another day farther away from what had happened.

She looked down slowly as she reached her locker, her numb fingers working the combination quickly as she tried to grasp exactly what had gone on a year ago, but failed. The memories were all blurry and faded, replaced by a friendship shattering, a crush bouncing about her thoughts, the end of school, and several new fanfictions.

_Damn. SMU hasn't been updated in forever. Same with Candlelight, and Two…double damn!_

The girl dropped her stuff inside quickly, picked up her books with a great heave, slammed her Axel-themed locker closed, and walked into her homeroom, greeted cheerfully by the Spanish teacher and her French teacher. She said hello in both languages like a good girl should, and walked out of the room.

Yep, another Monday for Pebbles the Wise.

-----------

Meanwhile, a long way away, time stood stock-still, save for two figures moving about in the darkness.

"Errrriiik." Amanda drawled his name out slowly, trying to get attention from the masked man who was looking around corners, looking for any sign of life besides themselves. She crossed her arms when he didn't answer.

"Shouldn't we be looking for Mr. Chicken and Ms. Little?"

Erik snorted. "Little? I'll be damned if she's small."

"She's younger than we are."

He turned to face her, putting a finger over her lips in order to quiet her down. "That's besides the point. We aren't her superiors."

"Ew...Xemnas…"

"…who?"

She shook her head as she pointed in front of her at the sound of footsteps. "I'll explain later."

-----------

"I'm quite cold. Do you have a coat?"

"The heck with you, I've only got a T-shirt!"

Victor squeaked as they moved through the purplish mist, staring in horror at the frozen, faceless figures, standing stock still like dolls. "Aren't you cold in just that?"

"Mebbe." Cricket held a backwards pinky to her O-shaped mouth.

"This is no time for-"

Suddenly a black and orange shape flew at them, screaming, "YOUR FACE!"

Both of the stop-motion styled figures fell over in fright, Cricket yelling, "REGAL BUTT! REGAL BUTT!" for no reason.

Amanda withdrew her bow and arrow. "Regal butt? …oh, Regal butt! I REMEMBER THAT!"

Erik crossed his arms over Victor's body, not even bothering to help the young boy scramble to his feet. "Regal…butt?"

Cricket and Amanda exchanged glances. "It's what you say when you can't think of how to react or what to say."

Victor stood shakily, his knees wobbling. "How…"

"Long story." Amanda grabbed Cricket and Victor's hands and dragged them in the direction that they were walking in. "We must leave. NAOW!"

xoxIIxox

**Regal butt. Please don't ask.**

**I can hardly remember how that came to be…even though it started at the beginning of this month or something. XD**

**And have you noticed that Holli and Willy are absent? ;3**


	2. An Encounter

**A total of two or three want me to continue. But maybe there's more.**

**MAYBE THERE'S AN ENTIRE WRITER'S BLOCK FANBASE...**

**Anyway. This contains some, uh, bashing of a girl in my school. Some of you may recognize her as one of my friends from the first WB. THINGS CHANGE, U GUYZ, LYK IT OR NOT. In exchange, I've put one of my bffl's in here that wasn't in the first installment.**

**And btw...MY GLASSES ARE GONE, IN THIS STORY AND OUT. I wear contacts 98 percent of the time now. Occasionally, I'll go, "Screw this!" and keep my blue, thick, square, newspaper reporter-like glasses on, but it's not often.**

xoxIIxox

Pebbles was staring at the clock expectantly, along with several other members of her class.

_Five...four...three...two...one..._

"DING. DING. DING. DI-" The clock was choked off from it's annoying beeping as the writer got mixed in with the large amount of kids moving quickly to get home. Personally, she wanted to sit down, have a Coke or maybe some peppermint chocolate, and watch Pita Ten until it was time to do homework.

"EL BANO!" a girl with blond hair and purplish blue glasses screamed at Pebbles.

Pebbles grinned and said, as is customary of her and Caroline's in-joke, "Your mom is El Bano."

Caroline: the friend who had joined the Peb-Peb-Friendship Wagon sometime between October and December. The two bonded instantly and almost never formally fought. Both had the ability to make the other laugh so hard that they could barely eat their lunch, play video games obsessively, and fangirl over people. The only difference was that Caroline fangirled very emotional characters, while Pebbles fangirled the often overloved characters with a burning passion (cookies to her if they were hot, which was one of the main reasons anyway) and spat and hissed and made various animal noises at ones she didn't like. Kristen was still a best friend for life, Mike had sort of switched groups (but they were still friendly with each other), and Mia had moved entirely, switching from the person Pebbles and Caroline and Kristen would DO NOTHING without to the person that they would BE HAPPIER without. Not that she had become annoying, she had just become a lying, deceitful, little--

(long, long pause as Authoress runs around room, screaming hateful words that have been censored for the sensitive ears of your little ones)

OK! Long story short, she became a bad girl and broke off from them and is now trying to get them back. In the meantime, she's, as Pebbles puts it, "whoring" off all of their other friends.

Caroline poked her. "I have Homework Club today, so I can stalk you."

"Great, time to spam you with Dane Cook rants of various shapes and sizes."

-----------------------

"This closet is so CRAMMED!" Cricket screamed as she tried to move.

Victor nodded as he put something on the shelf in order to create more space for himself, making several other things tumble down. "I agree! It was much cleaner when we were last here."

Amanda, meanwhile, was working with Erik to open the door. "There's something on the other side," she hissed. Erik got down on his hands and knees and tried to shove the large object aside, but it didn't work. "Stand back."

They all moved back, with Cricket and Amanda muttering, "No room...impossible order of the year award goes to Erik..."

After backing up a bit himself, Erik rammed into the door. The thing flopped harmlessly aside, and the door flew open to reveal...

...the messiest room in eternity.

"Is it me, or did she fall apart while we were gone?" Victor asked as he stumbled out and took deep breaths.

Amanda shook her head. "No, this room is going to be just as messy when she's older. It's just that she kept it clean for us."

Erik took a look at the thing. "Her backpack. We were pushing and shoving for a BACKPACK."

A large squeal erupted from the hallway, and all four looked up to see Pebbles, in a black T-shirt and gray dress pants, with no glasses and messy hair, clutching a cup of water, gaping at them.

"What the hell?"

All of them, the group and the writer, said at once, "I thought you were gone!"

xoxIIxox

**Yey, an update.**


	3. A Greeting

**Whoo, Part I Don't Know of my crazy updating spree! This is the last one I need to do because Candlelight needs more RP sessions to continue.**

xoxIIxox

"Gone? GONE? Of all the words, couldn't there be a more accurate one?" Amanda asked aloud, smacking herself in the forehead.

Quickly Pebbles ran in, put down her water, and ushered them to sit on the bed. "How did you all get here! I was told it was nearly impossible to..." Her eyes darted around. "Hey, where's Holli? Wonka's gone too!"

Cricket looked down and shook her head. "We never saw them on our way here."

"But how did you get here?"

Erik then proceeded to explain for them all.

Apparently they had been in a sort of for what seemed like a week, but then they had found a way out through a mysterious blue light. More poking and prodding resulted in Victor adding the contents of the limbo: people looking permanently shocked, standing in perfectly straight lines that seemed to go on through eternity. The dome-like ceiling looked like the night sky with no stars, moon, or clouds: just milky blue-blackness going on forever. Everything had been surrounded by a fine, dark purple mist, and no sound could be heard, not even their own footsteps; they had to talk to get rid of the pressing silence all around them.

And poking and prodding on the fictional characters' part had resulted in Pebbles revealing that she HAD deleted Holli's fic because she had run straight out of fresh ideas very quickly. It was beyond writer's block, and Pebbles deemed it a dead end, like running for a mile through hot sun barefoot on even hotter concrete and reaching what was supposeded to be an oasis, filled with water and life, but reaching an unforgiving, totally smooth brick wall with nowhere else to go but back, deleting all your progress along the way. Amanda then noticed that she had seen Holli after a day, standing in one of the lines with the other people.

"It must have been where all the deleted characters go, then," Pebbles mumbled, staring at the floor. "Seeing as you guys are real, but live on another plane of existance...now we know where you go when you "die", so to speak..."

An awkward silence descended for a while until Victor brought up the topic of the hundreds of notes they had received during their time here.

"All of them dissolved, save for a couple..."

Pebbles ran over to her desk and rooted through the drawers. Tape rolls, pencils, old drawings, magazines, instruction manuals for phones, computers, programs...all of them flew out quickly as the writer tried to discover where all her stuff had gone.

"Here we go!" she said triumphantly as she held up a few pieces of torn paper.

One was the pen's instructions...

_When a character is in bold, it's inside the pen._

_When it's not, it's outside._

_If you want to release a character, say the name aloud, press the button, and think, "Out!" Vice-versa for containing one._

_If you want to be replaced, twirl while doing the process for taking a character out._

_To get out the entire group, simply press the button. The pen will do the rest._

_The pen will guide you. Use it well. It will attack the people you need to attack. It will defend the people you need to defend._

The second was Victor's note that he had received personally...

_Victor,_

_This makes no sense to you now, but something will happen to you. You are of most importance to this group. Remember:_

_Torniquet._

_Blue Skies._

_Theatre._

The last had only two initials on it: H.P. and H.C.

"I swear it had three...," Cricket mumbled, taking the note and examining it for herself.

"Yes, but where did the other go?"

Victor pointed at Pebbles' pumpkin necklace. "Didn't you get that from someone?"

Pebbles looked down at the pumpkin, glittering happily from its place on her collarbone. "Yeah..."

And the memories came back.

Jack was off the list. There were two to go.

-----------------------------

That night, a fragile girl in her very early 20's started to arise from where she lay, sprawled out on a hard surface.

"Ugh...oh...where-"

A white house stood before her, towering over her small frame in the moonlight. A light was on in the top window, and voices drifted slowly to her from her place on the dark tar.

Somehow...

Someway...

She wanted to go inside.

xoxIIxox

**Who do you think the girl is? -wink-**


	4. A New Person

**WOOO BREAK. It's almost over now, so during all my free time I've decided to pick up the pace with my fics so that I can shoot out new releases during spring and summer (yes, I'll use summer as a tool to clear out stories). That might mean longer chapters per update. MIGHT.**

xoxIIxox

That night, all of the people, fictional, copyrighted, or otherwise, were talking rapidly when there was a bang on the window.

"What the hell?" Pebbles ran over to the window and pulled the blind up.

All that was outside was blackness, the trees whistling in the wind, and clouds. She shrugged and was about to close the blind when she saw a rock come flying toward the window again, banging it hard.

She opened the window, despite the freezing cold outside, and stuck her face up to the screen. "HEY! STOP THROWING-"

"Ma'am!"

A small person, barely outlined by the night, was waving her arms and jumping up and down in the middle of the driveway. "Madamoiselle! Please, may I come in? It's chilly out!"

Pebbles blinked.

She blinked again.

Suddenly Erik joined her at the window. "Oh my- TORI! Get out of the cold! Go to the door, we'll let you in!"

Amanda joined them at the window, then Cricket, then Victor. "Holy shit! That IS Tori! Zoh my God, let her in!"

--------------

"So...you just appeared out there?"

Tori's frail form shivered under the thick blanket that Pebles had given to her. "Well...yes. All of a sudden, I felt weak. Soon afterward I collapsed."

Amanda put her head in her hands. "What now? Are Ziki and Zency coming here too?"

Pebbles looked shocked. "For the love of Axel, please don't let them! They have no matching copyrighted characters!"

Erik was sitting in the corner, writing notes on the entire situation down. It was quite incredible, what was happening, and in his opinion they all needed logs to better explain everything.

Victor looked her over. "You're very unusual, speaking French with a slight English accent."

The singer looked over to him and raised an eyebrow in confusion. "You are as unusual as I am! You're made of sticks, for goodness' sake!" In response to this, Victor blushed and looked away.

Meanwhile, Amanda and Pebbles were bickering over who would appear, if anyone else did appear at all.

Amanda gasped. "WHAT IF SHINOBU GETS HERE."

"EW. THEN SEPHIROTH WILL FOLLOW."

"EW. THEY NEED TO RENT OUT A ROOM."

"EW!"

"EW!"

Both girls started doing the "Kristen ew" (a long, drawn out "eeeew" in a deep voice) in unison at the prospect of them running around the house.

Cricket threw an UglyDoll sleepily at them from where she lay on the floor, curled up in the pillows from Pebble's bed. "SHADDUP. I'm trying to sleep!"

Erik threw the UglyDoll with twice as much force back at her. "Then sleep and be silent, girl! I'm trying to write!"

Victor sighed and lied down on the floor. "Why don't we all sleep and be silent?"

"Yes."

All of them turned to Tori, who had been silent for a very long time while they were all shouting and screaming.

She was staring at the floor, zoned out. "Yes...that should work. It should only last two weeks, and then we'll all go home together..."

Cricket sat up. "Tori, you ok?"

Her head snapped up. The black hair that flowed from her head started sticking up from the static lying in the blanket, but she didn't notice or seem to care. "Oh, yes. I'm fine. I was just...thinking about how we were going to go about this situation."

Erik logged it down. Things were starting to get interesting.

xoxIIxox

**Actually, the prospect of Shinobu and Sephiroth or Ziki and Zency is interesting...I just might add them or give them cameos. Therefore, this will be the most character-condensed fic of the series, since Penname (the final one) only has three main characters, to say the least. --wink wink nudge nudge-**

**Oh, if you don't know Shinobu, Ziki, and/or Zency, then look at my website. I have short bios for all them.**


	5. A Bunch of Newbies

After warring with myself about Zencelscia, Ziki, Shinobu, and Sephiroth...THEY'RE ALL GOING INTO THE STORY AUJURIFJNCIEU

But only for this installment. Only. Special treat for you guys, because I love you. .-.

And I own 75 percent of those characters I just mentioned. Sephiroth is all for Squeenix, not for me.

I'm not going to bore you with long, long descriptions, but I'll add tidbits, plus my website has descriptions for all of them and there are Ziki and Zency chibis in one of my pictures on DevArt.

xoxIIxox

Meanwhile, two girls were wandering the empty sidewalks of a small little town at night, which -happened- to be near Pebbles' neighborhood.

Zency kicked a can into a nearby storm drain. "This place is so behind!"

"Behind? What do you mean?" Ziki blinked as she rubbed her real arm with her mechanical one.

"Behind, as in...it's old school! There's hardly any technology! It's living in the past!" Zency covered her face with one gloved hand and sighed deeply. "Oh, God...if I don't see a machine soon, I'm bound to explode."

Before Ziki could comment on her sister's behavior, a lone car drove by. Inside, a bunch of teenagers from the high school were drinking soda, laughing and singing along to Fergie. (I dun like Fergie. D: Everytime Fergalicious comes on the radio, I yell, "Damn you, Fergie!" and whoever is driving the car changes the song.) They gave the sisters an odd look before the male driver said something and they drove off, screaming and giggling as they were before.

Ziki rubbed her head as her arm beeped a warning. "Does that count as a machine?"

"It's an old machine," Zency said stubbornly, straightening her glasses and walking ahead of Ziki, leaving her to stand there in the dark.

The twenty-three year old scientist was usually fine when they were at home, but it was a much different place and time that they lived in, along with more technology. This era...it looked exactly as Ziki's textbooks had decribed it. What was it...2007? It was obviously the dead of winter due to the chill and the snow that was starting to fall, melting as soon as it hit the ground.

Ziki, the fifteen year old outcast, touched the ground. "Sad...they still have global warming."

"Well? Are you coming, Zik?"

She looked up. Zency was much farther away. She was staring (no, squinting) at her.

Ziki nodded and lifted her robotic arm before she lifted her body. "Yes. We should go."

------------------

Coming from another direction were two people. One was incredibly tall and muscular, while the other stood at a formidable height but not as tall or strong as her partner.

Sephiroth waved his arm near his head, trying in vain to shoo the snowflakes from falling on his silver hair. "Damn snow..."

Shinobu looked up, almost mesmerized by the white specks falling from the black sky. "I think it's pretty. I could stay out here for a long time." A breeze picked up, sweeping Sephiroth's coat from his ankles and prickling her thinly clothed arms with goosebumps. "With more layers on, of course."

The cold was not what made her shiver, but rather the fact that Sephiroth had stopped, and his protective grip on her had tightened considerably. In the little light coming from streetlamps, Shinobu could see that his eyes were narrowed and he was now holding himself in a defensive manner. "Sephiroth? Hey...Sephiroth?"

He released her slowly, his left hand drawing the Masumane from where it sat in its sheath on his side. "Stay," he commanded firmly as he started to walk forward quickly.

Closer inspection revealed that he was running towards two girls that were walking down the street, far ahead of them. (Imagine Sephiroth and Shinobu walking down a long street, and then there's a four way intersection a little way in front of them, far away that you can't see people clearly but close enough not to be a long walk.)

"Sephiroth! Stop!"

"Stay!" he yelled back, not looking at her as he ran forward, sword now lifted high above his head, poised to strike.

One of the figures turned and squealed audibly, pushing her companion out of the way and putting her arms out in front of her. Instead of hitting her, Sephiroth stopped and held the weapon close to her nose.

Shinobu caught up to him and noticed that the girl he was threatening was a teenage girl with long silver hair like his, except it seemed to spike outwards and curl at the bottom. She was lanky, but what caught her eye was the arm that was in place of where her actual right one should be. The person she pushed aside was shorter, but was obviously older, as the maturity in the eye that was not covered by short silver hair showed.

"Who are-" Sephiroth stopped, raising an eyebrow curiously as Ziki's eye color changed for a brief second before fading back to green. "Do that again."

"D-d-d-o wha-what again, s-s-sir?" Her eye color changed to orange again.

Sephiroth put his sword back in its sheath and backed up, allowing Shinobu to help Zency off of the tar that made up the cool road. "Your eyes...they change when you are stressed, correct?"

"Al-yes." Ziki backed up a considerable distance from the former general and tearing her eyes off of his.

"Thank you, Miss," Zency said cheerily, gaining her balance once again and brushing herself off. When she felt her pocket, however, her smile faded slowly. "My meds! Where are-"

"These?" Shinobu picked a blue bottle off the ground and held it close to her ear, hearing the pills inside clack around.

"Yeah...those." She gently took them out of Shinobu's grip and put them back in her pants pocket.

Sephiroth was still glaring at Ziki, trying to intimidate her, but she refused to look back up.

"Sis! Let's go."

"Wait."

Both of the girls stopped and looked back at the couple, Zency with genuine curiosity, Ziki with fear.

"Where are you going?" Shinobu swallowed. "We're going somewhere too."

Ziki pulled a note out of her back pocket and shuffled slowly over to them, holding it up so that Sephiroth could snatch it quickly from her hands and read it. "We're supposed to go here, it says."

Shinobu peeked at the paper, then silently took a note from her pocket and held it out for Ziki to take back. "Us too."

Sephiroth and Shinobu's note had an address, written in black ink on an unusual looking paper. Zency and Ziki held an exact copy.

-------------------

Pebbles woke up in the middle of the night after a long, disturbing dream. She couldn't remember it, but it scared her to bits and pieces and made her paranoid. However, she couldn't turn on the light, lest she wake the rest of the group, so she sat there, hugging her knees and reciting movie lines quietly to keep her in check. Looking to the window, a jolt went through her when she saw movement outside.

Silently she peeked past the shade, her sleepy eyes blinking.

_Hunh? Snow? Wait...who's that?_

xoxIIxox

This has over 1,000 words without the notes...that is a lot of words, plzkthxbai.


	6. A Meeting

**Oh my God, this is so fun to write. It kinda got off to a slow start for me, but now I'm definitely loving it like the first installment.**

xoxIIxox

_So cold, so cold, so cold, so cold..._

Pebbles clutched her arms close to her body, trying to preserve the small amount of warmth that her cool winter jacket provided her. Sure, it was fine with a sweatshirt and normal clothes, but the only thing that shielded her was her pajamas, and that certainly wouldn't suffice for anything. Snow stuck to her messy hair as well as melted, making it glisten.

She hurried out in snow boots to the end of the driveway, where four figures watched her approach silently, almost unnervingly. No sooner was she halfway down the driveway was she struck down. Her head would have split open had it not been for one of the figures darting forward and catching her.

"Hey! What's wrong with you, sir?!" a female's voice yelled. Pebbles couldn't make out features in the dim streetlamps, but she could feel her frail body shake under her weight.

A male voice "hmph'd" indignantly, the sheathing of a sword piercing the still air. "I could kill you as well, and I certainly would...if it weren't for my partner here."

Didn't she know that voice? It sounded an awfully lot like...

Pebbles squirmed. "Can you let me go? I'm not helpless."

The arms pushed her back up, and she stumbled a bit before gaining her footing and looking over the remaining people. The glint of metal caught her eye, and she pointed to a figure at random. "Step in the light for a second."

"Me?" The female backed up slowly towards the nearest streetlight, going faster when Pebbles started walking forward towards her, obviously finding her intimidating. Pebbles nearly laughed out loud. Her? Intimidating? Sure, when she went beserk, it was something to watch out for, but she couldn't knock someone out, let alone bring herself to kill them.

She decided that whoever it was wasn't moving fast enough (and was actually heading away from the light, as closer inspection showed), so she ran forward and gently nudged them back. Her eyes widened when she saw green ones looking down at her from underneath a mass of silver hair: another of her own creations, Ziki, was in front of her.

"Oh, jeezy-weezy..."

She grabbed another person, this one notably shorter than she was, and put her under the light as well. This one was Zency, not staring at her with a touch of fear and with curiosity, but rather giving her an odd look, asking silently what was going on inside her head and whether or not she had gone quite mad. Hardly being able to control herself or think it through enough, her hand darted forward and brushed the hair from the left side of her face.

"Hey!" The odd look turned into a glare when the skin-colored patch covering her missing eye was revealed. Mumbling a quick apology, Pebbles let the hair fall back and left Zency to reorganize it, annoyed, while she looked over the remaining two figures.

The conversation from before popped into her head again, and she pointed to the taller, more muscular one. "Can you say, 'The last thoughts of Geostigma's dead'?"

"Why should I?" the person answered cooly, but even though he didn't say what she needed him to say, that was all the proof Pebbles needed.

Breaking her New Year's Resolution quite quickly, she ran back inside, whispering, "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit," over and over under her breath.

Trusting her three characters and the greatest video game villian of all time to stay put, she tiptoed back upstairs and nudged the sleeping mass that she supposed was Amanda.

After a few pokes, the girl sat up and shook her hair from her eyes. "What?" she whispered loudly.

"We're gonna need more sleeping bags."

There was a long silence as Amanda thought it over. From the little light coming from the windows, she could see her eyes pop open. "Oh, HELL NO, you're kidding me!"

"Not kidding."

"Who is it?"

"Grab a coat and see."

While Amanda stumbled over everyone else in order to get a spare coat, Pebbles looked back out of the window in order to see how her new trainees were doing. Ziki and Zency were whispering to each other, Sephiroth was simply standing around with his arms crossed, and the last person (whom she could see now was Shinobu) was pacing around anxiously. One of the main questions about the latter was was she pregnant or not? They were all screwed if she was, because then she could have random Geostigma attacks in the middle of the night, wake everyone up, have morning sickness, etc. Not to mention they had only 9 months before she would go into labor, and they were in even deeper crap if that happened.

An audible _zip_ was heard in the silence, and Amanda stumbled back to Pebbles' side. "Ok, let's go."

--------------------------

"Then there's the question of where we keep them."

"In the basement? No, forget I said that, that's dumb..."

Shinobu was already asleep, curled up against Sephiroth's side. He was actually not too content with this for some odd reasont that he refused to say, and he was giving everyone a shifty look. Zency was poking around Pebbles' computer while Ziki watched, interested in the way it worked compared to their own back home. Only Cricket and Victor were still sleeping; Erik was sitting and watching over from the corner again, staring only at Tori, who was watching the Elraine sisters fiddle around. Unlike them, she was fascinated that there was such a machine around at all.

Pebbles ran a hand through her hair. "We're in deep shit if my parents notice we're up, you know that?"

Tori looked over at her. "Is it alright here for ladies to curse and generally act unladylike?"

Amanda burped. "Yus!"

Shinobu stirred in her sleep and Sephiroth looked down at her quickly, going back to surveying the group when he noted that she was still asleep. A purple pen sat in front of him.

"Amanda."

Both Amandas looked around.

"The younger one."

Amanda went back to trying to make some origami out of fake Chinese money while Pebbles stared at Sephiroth, scared even though he seemed to be in a calm state. I mean, HOW WOULD YOU FEEL IF YOU HAD HIM IN YOUR OWN BEDROOM. THAT IS SOME SCARY STUFF RIGHT THERE.

He picked up the pen slowly and read the label on it. "What is this?"

It hit Pebbles quickly, and she oh-ed in recognition of the idea. "That's right, the pen! We can cycle people through it."

Erik looked up, annoyed that it took her that long to get to the point. "Gee, I never knew."

"Aw, shut up..." She reached forward slowly and took the pen from Sephiroth's outstretched hand, feeling a bit like she was taking a lion's food away from it while it was in a pissy mood. Although she didn't do anything, the former general glared at her anyway and then contented himself with staring outside at the falling snow, his left hand absentmindedly running up and down Shinobu's arm.

"Fantastic!" Zency said in a Raine voice while she read over the data of some default file on there. "We don't have this anymore, we have something different, but this is so great! I never thought I'd see one!"

Ziki was trying her best to copy it all down onto a piece of paper a little faster than her sister scrolled down. Tori's eyes were wide and she was fiddling with a piece of her dress, trying desperately to make heads or tails of the code but failing slowly.

Amanda, given up on even the simplest origami design that was in the kit, tossed the paper to the side, slipped under some blankets, and tried to drift off with the light from the lamp still going. Erik followed her example and called Tori back to himself. She cast one final, wistful look at the computer, then walked back to his side and leaned against it, slipping off within minutes despite the brightness of the room.

Zency finally turned the computer off. "That's amazing, Pebbles, truly amazing."

Pebbles tore her eyes of Shinobu's cat ears, having been absentmindedly staring at them for the past few minutes. "Uh, thanks. My parents got it for me for Christmas."

Without warning, Ziki started crying. "I miss Mom and Dad! Christmas sucks now!"

While Zency tried to comfort her sister, she started to cry too.

Pebbles blushed furiously. Sephiroth grinned, both at her embarrasment at having made her characters that way and at the fact that Zency and Ziki were making fools of themselves. (At least, in his opinion.)

"Now I regret making them react like that," Pebbles muttered.


	7. A Strange Discovery

**I really should be updating SMU and whatnot, but whatever. WARM UP.**

xoxIIxox

In the morning, Pebbles woke up first...or so she thought. Victor sat on the foot-rest at the end of the bed, reading over a small piece of paper in one hand while the other one stroked a sleeping Dello.

"Victor!"

He started, causing Dello to lift her tiny poodle head, and turned towards Pebbles. "Oh. Good morning."

Cradling her head in one hand, Pebbles gestured towards the note. "What's that?"

"Something the Timekeeper gave to me," he mumbled, standing up and moving toward where Pebbles sat in order to give her the paper.

Slowly she took it. "Haven't heard from TK in a while..."

The note read:

_To whomever receives it._

_You may have noticed something peculiar about your house and the town you are in in general. That's because time has frozen. You are going to be alloted two weeks to accomplish a goal...that goal will lead you one step closer to the stronghold of Shadow and the next set of initials. I'll provide you with food, cash, etc., but all of you will otherwise be alone. Good luck!_

_-TK_

She shook her head in disbelief. How did TK know all this? Worst of all, was time really frozen?

"Is she fo-rizzle?"

"Fo...rizzle?" Victor cocked his head.

The writer sighed. "Yes, dumbass. I meant, is she for real, meaning, 'Is she not joking?'"

Victor paused. "Well, y-yes, she's speaking the truth. I checked."

Bolting out of bed, Pebbles ran out of her bedroom, mumbling something about how careless Victor was with the teen in question not far behind.

The door to her parents' room flew open, and the sight inside made her eyes pop.

"Jes-jeezy-weezy!"

Her parents stood still, quite literally frozen in in the middle of whatever they were doing. Her father was walking towards the bathroom, while her mother was starting to stand up from her reading chair. A quick trip downstairs found her brother in the same predicament, his lifeless eyes fixed on his TV screen.

The sound of people running up and down the stairs woke Cricket, who came up behind them, blinking groggily.

"Why the heck are you guys making so much noise?" she yawned, stretching and then scratching her head.

Victor gently pushed Cricket forward. "Take a look and see."

"...he's watching TV. No, wait...what the-?"

The blonde rushed forward and waved a hand in front of the boy's face. "Hey! Dude! Speak to me!"

Only silence greeted her hungry ears, and she sighed. "Looks like we're on our own then."

A new piece of paper, this one smaller than the last, appeared on the floor near Pebbles' bare feet. Victor pointed to it wordlessly, the action jsut enough to get her to notice the note. The paper only had two words printed on it.

_Fake equals green._

"The hell?" Pebbles showed it to Cricket and Victor.

There was a long pause as all three thought about it. Suddenly Victor snapped his inhumanly long fingers in triumph. "I have an idea! Who here has green eyes?"

Pebbles went through her list of all the people there. "Hmmm." Slowly and deliberately she formed her answer. "Tori...Sephiroth...Ziki."

Victor and Cricket exchanged smug glances. "Then we know where to look."

-------------------

"What?!"

"I just want to know how Sephiroth's treating you."

Shinobu straightened and tugged on a corner of her shirt, smiling a little as one of the more humerous verses of "My Unfortunate Erection" was sung. "Relatively good."

Pebbles gave her character the evil eye. "Spill, Shinobu. I know that's not all."

The girl squirmed, her short hair swishing. "He tends to follow me about..."

Pebbles leaned back and smirked. "Oh really."

"Yeah. Um..." She leaned forward and whispered, "He once tried to get me...um, in bed. I was handpicked to act as a sort of passageway for Jenova cells."

"When was this?!"

"About two weeks ago. The next day, he frightened me simply by kissing me -and I know how stupid that sounds- but I explained to him my feeling about love and he backed off. Sometimes I catch him staring at me, though, and he looks really sad or angry when he does."

Pebbles rubbed her eyes. "Ok. Just needed to-"

Something fell downstairs and Ziki squealed not too long afterwards.

"So sorry!" she called up.

While Pebbles got up to investigate, Shinobu wandered over to the computer, went down the iTunes list, and chose Mission To Mars by Ford instead.

Zency looked up quickly from the book about superstring theory she and Amanda were poring over. "Ooh, I like this song. Turn it up, please?"


	8. A Long Day

**Gragh, SMU ate my brain alive. o-o Sorry for the uber late update.**

xoxIIxox

It turns out Ziki had simply dropped a cookbook that she was looking through. Sephiroth was sitting at the table and scrutinizing her while Cricket was drawing on a spare piece of notebook paper she had found.

"What the hell were you trying to make, Zik?"

"Don't call me that."

Pebbles put her hands on her hips and grinned. "Why? I made ya, and Zency calls you that all the time."

Ziki's eyes narrowed and she pouted. "Fine, fine. You have a point."

Ziki had been flipping through the cookbook for a very simple reason: she was hungry. She hadn't eaten anything for a while, and neither had anyone else, but they didn't decide to take cooking up for themselves. Those lazy fictional characters. Ziki eventually settled for a sammich and sat on one of the nearby chairs, slowly eating it while Dello sat at her feet and stared up at her.

"Dog. Dog. Dog. Get it away please." She inched her toes away from the poodle slowly, glaring at the tiny thing. Dello whined and backed out of the room, seating herself on the carpet outside of the kitchen.

"Awwww!" Cricket walked over and cuddled Dello. "She just wanted some love," she whined.

"She wanted food," Sephiroth and Pebbles mumbled at the same time.

------------------

The rest of the day went on uneventfully...if you count Zency discovering the joys of DDR and Tori trying out Tales of the Abyss as uneventful.

"No! Come on, Madamoiselle! Heal me!" she shouted desperately at Natalia.

"Can I use this?" her voice asked as a tiny speech bubble over her battle stats appeared, reading "Orange Gel".

"I suppose so!"

Natalia used the Orange Gel and healed Tori, who was playing as Tear.

"Tear sucks!" Amanda hissed. "Use Luke! And why did you get rid of Jade?!"

"He was rather frightening...both of them, actually."

"Ugh." Amanda rolled over on the bed, lazily looking sideways at Pebbles. "I am so obnoxiously bored."

"Go play DDR with Zency!" Pebbles mumbled, annoyed as she tried to decipher a speech in Romeo and Juliet for school.

"Naw. She just wants to play Maxx Unlimited, Route 80's, and Dead End on Heavy until she drops dead."

Victor ran into the room, his hair touseled from running and his pale skin flushed. He bent over to catch his breath and wipe the sweat from his forehead, taking care not to drop the note held in his hand. Wordlessly he held it out, allowing Shinobu to take the paper.

"OH MY GOD! I WON!" Zency's voice drifted faintly from the basement two floors below.

"'You've done well for your first day,'" Shinobu read slowly. She squinted at the writing. "'But you have gotten nothing done. Two weeks can fly by awfully fast. You might want to hurry.'"

Pebbles looked up from the tiny book she was flipping through. "WHAT?! We were never shown anything to do!"

"On the contrary," Victor mumbled, "I was just out for a walk, and look what I found."

He held out what looked like a stick, all beaten up and covered in whorls from tree bark.

"A stick?!" Erik asked, looking away from Tori's progress on the screen to stare at the thing in distaste. "Good going, boy. That will help us greatly."

"But-but-but..." Victor stalled, trying to get away from the group's disapproving looks. "It-it-it flew out from nowhere and hit me on the-"

"Whatever, Victor," Amanda snorted, grabbing the controller from Tori's hand and forcing her party to escape from a very hard monster. "You have fun with your 'magical sticks'."

Shinobu held up a hand, her eyes still glued to the note. "Wait, people, wait. There's more here." She tossed a stray purple strand of hair out of her line of vision before continuing.

"'If you can find what I've placed here, then props. That'll help you find out who you're due to meet next.'"

Pebbles took the stick from Victor's hand, turning it over in her hand. "It's pointy on one end, and it feels kind of funny. It looks rough, but it feels really smooth..."


	9. An OOC Tori and Note Deciphering

**Blub, blub.**

**Why am I lagging so much with this? Hm.**

xoxIIxox

In spite of Victor's best efforts to explain himself, the stick found outside went unforgotten and everyone continued on their merry little ways. Zency continued to be addicted to DDR, Tori continued to try and beat Tales of the Abyss, and Pebbles generally bitched about how bored she was.

"Why don't you update one of your fanfictions?" Victor asked her, looking up from the book he was reading.

"Don't feel like it," Pebbles moped. She had been staring out the window for the past half-hour, lying on the arm of the big armchair in one corner of the room. Yes, I do that. Shush.

"Would you like to play with me?" Tori asked, pausing her game.

"Naw. If you're just going to bash Jade, what's the point?"

"I don't bash anyone!" she snapped OOC'ly, whipping her head around towards the rest of the group.

Pebbles turned to look at her, ignoring Tori's strange behavior. "Sure you do. How do you explain the fact that you knocked him out of the party even though he has all these good spells and such?"

Tori growled and turned back to the screen, loud enough to capture Erik's attention.

"Tori? Are you feeling quite alright?"

"Fine!" she squeaked, giving a wide grin towards Erik.

"Damn OCs," Pebbles muttered, turning back to the window.

-----------------------------

MEANWHILE.

Shinobu was trying to decipher a note that they had found lying by the couch.

"It shouldn't take that long," Cricket mumbled, writing down her ideas on another piece of paper. "Scooch over, your big head is in the way."

"Would you like to repeat that?"

Cricket glanced over towards Sephiroth worridly from where she sat on Shinobu's left. "No sir."

He smirked, returning to his own paper. "Good."

Shinobu leaned back and rubbed her eyes. This was almost as hard as trying to write an article at three in the morning, running on nothing but coffee. Throw in cryptic metaphors as well and you're all set.

"Good God," she yawned, taking a swig of water. "May we stop?"

"No," Cricket answered briefly, snorting before glancing quickly at Sephiroth to gauge his reaction. "We gotta keep going with this, no matter what."

"That sounded cheesy."

"I'm aware, please kay thanks."

-------------------------------

MEANWHILE ONCE AGAIN.

Ziki watched Zency and Amanda try and play with Pebbles' softball stuff, her head in her hands. What was taking that group so long to try and get the letter's meaning pinned down. "Can we go back inside? I'm bored."

Zency started to run after a ball Amanda had managed to hit pretty far. "Of course not, dearest!" she said in an old lady voice. "There's nothing to do inside!"

"We could try and help that group inside try and break up the letter."

Amanda pretended to throw the bat at Ziki; said girl responded by cowering in the corner. "Zikiiii! It's too early for this!"

Ziki sqeaked, "It's three in the afternoon."

Zency, having successfully retreived the ball, ran back to where Amanda stood patiently and wound up her arm for a pitch. "How would you know? Time's stopped." Ziki opened her mouth to explain, but Amanda pointed the bat at her.

"And don't say that you can tell by the position of the sun in the sky or some bullshit like that."

----------------------------------

"Done!"

Shinobu successfully threw her pencil down, causing both Cricket and Sephiroth to look up in surprise.

"I found where we're supposed to go! Anyone know of a mall around here?"


	10. An Argument

**lol, cars.**

xoxIIxox

"Malls."

Sephiroth covered his face with his hand in exasperation. "Yes, malls. List as many as you know in the area."

"...can it be out of the area?" Pebbles asked feebly.

Before Sephiroth could yell at her, Zency interjected. She waved her hand around as she drawled, "Just say all the ones you know. They can be as far as possible."

"Just keep inside the state," Ziki added, not looking up from her Sudoku puzzle.

"Hmmmmm..."

--------------------------

"One?" Pebbles crossed her arms as best she could. "Only one person here- motorcycles don't count, Shinobu!"

Shinobu put down her arm sadly. "Oh...then forget I ever said anything."

Everyone was standing in the driveway of Pebbles' house, the sunny day still sunny even though it was the equivalent of 6:30 at night. How do I know that, even when time is stopped? Well, that's for me to-

Cricket shook her fist at the sky. "If you can't drive, then shut up!"

Anyway, everyone was trying to figure out how to get to the nearest mall without walking, since if they walked, they'd get there in the middle of the night and everyone would be exhausted.

"Can't this wait until tomorrow?" Victor whispered to Erik.

"Apparently not," he whispered back.

Pebbles pointed her Speakin' stick at them, which happened to be Sephiroth's Masumane. How did I get his Masumane? Go figure... "No conniving!"

"We weren't conniving!" Victor whined, just barely dodging the sword.

"Good. So...only Zency can drive a CAR?"

Ziki's real arm popped up. "Permission to talk!"

"Permission granted!"

"How are we going to pay for gas?"

"WE DON'T NEED TO PAY FOR FUCKING GAS, ZIKI!" Amanda yelled angrily, hitting Ziki upside the head.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Zency came in between the two. "Now, let's not fight. Let's be rational..."

Sephiroth crossed his arms. "Rational left the vicinity a waaaay long time ago."

"Well, I- oh, crap."

"Haha."

Pebbles held the Grammar Nazi stick straight up into the air and nearly toppled over from the weight. "Rational forgot his backpack, ok?! Now, assuming my mom's car is-"

"Mmph!" Ziki held up her robotic arm.

"She doesn't speak idiot, Ziki," Sephiroth hissed.

"MMMPH!"

Amanda let her go.

"Good God!" Ziki sighed, glaring at Amanda. "Permission to speak!"

"Permission granted," Shinobu sighed, rolling her eyes.

"If both your mom and your dad's car has five seats..."

"Including The Suicide Seat?" Cricket piped. (Just so you know, my dad's Element has four seats, but it IS possible to fit a fifth person between the two back seats. MY family named this The Suicide Seat because it has no seatbelt.)

"Yes, whatever! Anyhow, there's ten of us, and one person can drive, and five seats in one car..."

While Victor recounted the group curiously, Shinobu said, "I'm sure driving a car isn't hard. I've tried before." (At this remark, Zency snorted and went into a corner to brood.)

"That was when you were five," Sephiroth mumbled absentmindedly, "And you crashed your mom's SUV into a tree."

"How do you know about that?!"

"Wait, wait, wait!" Victor thrust his hand into the air. "PTS?"

"Add an M and that's..." Erik hit Amanda on the back of the head to shut her up.

"Permission granted!" Pebbles said, pointing the Speakin' stick at him and totally ignoring the antics of her rowdy OCs.

"There's...nine of us..."

There was a silence. Erik's eyes were wide as he tried to calculate all the places a twenty year old singer could go in a different time and country. Which is not very far, let me tell ya...

"No Suicide Seat!" Cricket yelled, totally killing the moment.


	11. A Pointless Journey

**Hey, I'm back from DC! Lucky me.**

xoxIIxox

Pebbles, not wanting to deal with having to worry about driving and cramming everyone in cars, simply decided that they would walk to the mall. Sure, she admitted, the mall was way far away from her house...

It was about then that Erik suggested that there would be one car group and one walking group.

Soooo Pebbles monitored the walking group.

"Some say you're trouble, boy, just because you like to destroy..."

Sephiroth clutched at his head. "Stop singing!"

"What?" Amanda frowned. "Don't be hatin' because it's true."

Shinobu came between the two before any more hatin' could sprout. "I have to agree with Sephiroth, Amanda. Stop singing."

"What is that song, anyhow?" Sephiroth asked.

"The Fallen by Franz Ferdinin-Ferdani-ugh!" Pebbles stomped her foot. "Firden-"

"Ferdinand," Amanda corrected her.

"Yes, that! I am so bad at speaking."

Shinobu nodded. "One of my coworkers has a speech impediment. He complains as well."

Pebbles mulled this over. "I never gave you any coworkers."

"It's canon now," Amanda said. "You wrote it in this fic."

(Somewhere in the Northeast, sitting at a messy desk in an equally messy room, a longhaired girl stomped her foot and cursed loudly.)

"But all I wrote out at this point is...the interaction, slight plot development...somewhat lime?"

Sephiroth stared at Pebbles curiously. "Lime?"

"Implied sex. So it says, 'Oh, blablabla, they had sex, whatever.' But then lemons actually describe the scenes..."

------------------------

After what seemed like an eternity, they all reached the mall. Since the mall was in the process of being remodeled, over half the stores in there were closed, including Gamestop. Which made Pebbles frustrated.

"Argh!" She banged on the windows. "You would think that if TK actually had something that she wanted us to do, it would be here!"

Erik crossed his arms. "May I ask why? There is only one video game character here."

"I don't know!" Pebbles kept moving, furious at the lack of clues.

It was an eerie thing, having a dead-empty mall. Well...not so empty. People were frozen in their daily activities: little kids tugging at their parents' pants/skirts, employees handing out pamplets, customers handing shopkeepers money for merchandise. Expressions were still, eyes empty.

And there was no sign of TK, notes, or Tori anywhere.

Victor shivered, at the back of the group and lagging. He never did well with silence, seeing as most silences he had taken part in had been awkward silences that occured because of him. "Can we strike up coversation or somesuch? It's too quiet here."

"You're too quiet," Pebbles snapped.

"Calm down!" Ziki stepped in front of Pebbles, succeeding in infuriating her further. "You're in a terrible mood for no reason!"

Said writer gritted her teeth. "I'm frustrated, ok?! We haven't seen anything. It's as if...if...someone told you you won a free trip to Hawaii and then once you got to the airport they told you there was no such flight!"

She shoved past Ziki, heading towards the end. "Goodness gracious God," she growled, adding over her shoulder, "Hurry up, dammit!"

Ziki's eyes narrowed, flashing orange. "What's wrong with her?" she asked Zency curiously.

Zency remained silent. After all, she was a scientist, not a psychologist. She had learned early on not to speak if there was nothing to speak about. There was no reasoning in creating information from air, proof from nothingness.

"Z-Zency!" Ziki shook her sister, but there was still no response. Zency gave her sister an apologetic look before continuing with Pebbles.

Confused, she whirled on the rest of the characters. "Anyone else want to tell me what is happening with her?"

No one answered for a while. Then...

"Just leave her," Shinobu said dismissively. "She's obviously in a foul mood. It would be good if you just let her think it out."

"Why?!"

"That's all I'm going to say." Shinobu led the rest of the group in the direction Zency and Pebbles were heading. "We have work to do. Follow or go back."

The silence descended once more as the group got some distance from Ziki. She plopped down on the floor and clenched her fists. No...not now...why was she getting irritated over such a small deal? It couldn't be...her blood felt like it was boiling, a sick feeling settled in her stomach...

She was angry.

Ziki put her face in her hands, trying to get the terrible feelings to blow over, but to no avail...

"Hey!" she half-screamed, half-whined. "Someone help!"

Cricket turned, but she didn't look directly at Ziki. Rather, she was looking behind her.

"Ziki! Move!"

Ziki started to look behind her, but was interrupted by a hand swiping at her face. She dodged in time, rolling to the side. Furiously, she wiped her tears away to stare at what had tried to hit her.


	12. A Fight: Part 1

**Now we're getting somewhere. It's crazy plot development from now on you guys.**

xoxIIxox

Ziki scrabbled backwards on the cool tile floor. She screamed for help desperately, this time her cries attracting the attention of the rest of the party.

A copy of Ziki stood in front of the real one, eyeing her with pure hostility. Her fists were clenched around an enourmous mallet, robotic arm not making a sound, unlike the true Ziki, who's arm was beeing loudly and rapidly like a bomb about to explode.

"Hey!" Zency came forward to stand protectively in front of Ziki, jabbbing a finger at the imitation. "Who are you?"

She merely shrugged in silent reply.

"I'm absolutely sure you're not the real Ziki, you coldblooded little-"  
"I am your warning," the copy interrupted calmly. Shocked and furious at the sudden intrusion, Zency glared straight into its eyes, searching without success for some trace of deceit, some weakness written there. It had a perfect poker face, though, and it seemed that it wouldn't let any of its thoughts show through.

"Wait, woah." Pebbles jogged to the scene, looking first at Zency then at the replica Ziki. "You're- you can't be...what the hell are you do-"

The imitation whirled on Pebbles, swinging the mallet at her. Pebbles tried to jump back in order to dodge the blow, but the weapon caught her feet and she hurtled to the floor. She hit the ground with a curse, rubbing at her wrists while scrutinizing the replica with reproach.

"Silence. This does not involve you, girl," it ordered coldly, snapping from its collected exterior for a moment.

"What?! Are you telling her to back off?!" Zency again jabbed a finger at her, taking a step forward to stare up at her properly. "Spare me! If anything, this involves _her_!"

"This has nothing to do with Miss Amanda," the replica Ziki snapped at Zency. "Or, rather," she added, smirking, "Should I adorn her with that pet name?"

"Sh-shut up!" Zency reached up to smack her, but the replica caught her hand and twisted her wrist. Zency hissed, writhing in pain, "Then who does it have to do with?!"

In a second, Zency was flying towards a nearby store window, hitting the thick glass hard. It shattered, pieces flying all over the floor. The real Ziki stumbled away from the fragments of glass, one of the pieces piercing her boot. She yelped and tried to pull it out, failing.

Zency shakily stood from the inside of the shop. She panted, "Alright, I see how it is. You want me to fight you?"

"Zency! You don't even have a weapon!" Pebbles shouted, flailing her hands. "Get someone else to do it!"

By now the remaining party members had caught up to where everything was headed, some drawing their weapons- namely, only Cricket and Amanda drew their weapons, because the others either a) Couldn't fight or b) Didn't want to fight.

Amanda, keeping one arrow aimed towards the real arm of the replica, added, "Keep out of this, Zency."

Zency shook her head. "No, guys, I can-"

"Shut up!" the replica roared at Zency.

"Excuse me?!"

"I will explain! You know nothing!" Before Zency could reply, the replica turned on her heel and pointed her mallet at the party. "Weapons away. Attempts to kill me will be futile."

"Futile?" Shinobu snorted. "You don't sound less pathetic than you are by using big words."

The replica growled. "Would you rather fight me?"

"N-no!" Shinobu backed up, struggling to redeem herself before she found herself in serious trouble. "No! Explain yourself!"

The replica's eyes narrowed. "As you wish." She turned back to Zency and flicked her hand. A hatchet appeared in Zency's grip. She stared at it curiously while the replica said dully, "Fight me. Find my weakness. If you can defeat me, I shall give you your warning."

"And if not?"

"You die, and the party must continue without you."

Zency stared at the ground in thought. Die? Where did fictional characters really go when they died? Heaven? Did they go to that empty place Victor had described, with all the empty people gawking blankly into infinity? No...that was for deleted characters, killed while still happy and well. The question was intriguing her to the extent that she nearly forgot to answer.

Zency held the hatchet back at the ready and flashed a toothy grin at everyone. "Sounds good to me."

"Zencelscia!" Ziki screamed, running towards her sister in order to stop her before she went any further. The replica shoved her backwards roughly, paying no attention to her tears. "Don't! I don't want you dead!"

Zency launched herself towards the replica. "Whoever said I was going to lose?"


	13. A Fight: Part 2

**Dadada.**

xoxIIxox

The replica smirked, weapon resting carelessly at her side. "Well? Have you given up yet?"

Zency panted with exhaustion, brushing the hair out of her face before letting it fall back again. "No, not yet," she gasped, "I'm not done with you."

"Let it go, Zency," Pebbles warned. She and the others had taken seats far from the fight, lest they get injured. One of her hands was sitting on Zency's arm, trying to get her to calm down during the whole ordeal.

Zency sucked at the blood that was trying to escape her split lip. She was at her limit; should she really just admit defeat? It wasn't like her to give up so easily, but if she even got poked she would collapse. She sighed, coughing a little as she shook her head. "One more try. Please, just one more try."

The fake Ziki raised an eyebrow. "Such courage," she muttered, raising her weapon. "Alright. I have no objection."

Ziki tried to get up, but she was restrained by several people. "That's not fair! My sister's gonna pass out if she keeps going!"

"It's plenty fair, Zik," Zency snapped halfheartedly at her sister, holding her own hatchet at the ready. "I have no objection either."

In fifteen seconds it was over, Zency slumping against a nearby wall, now out of energy and on the verge of becoming unconsious as the replica stared at her in disgust.

"Know your own limits, Zencelscia," she hissed, "I could've easily killed you in your state and yet you went at me anyway, knowing well that you were going to lose."

"I'm not...I'm fine," Zency wheezed, taking a swipe at the replica but missing by a mile. Blood trickled from a wound in her head, leaking into her mouth and mingling with the blood from her lip.

The replica snorted and dismissed her weapon, turning from her. "Useless. You've proved your own bravery, but not so much strength." She turned towards the group- Sephiroth looking on with a bored expression, Shinobu's eyes wide, Pebbles glancing back at forth between the injured Zency and the fake Ziki, the real Ziki nibbling at her nails and wiping at the tears in her eyes, Erik seeming to be drawing a blank, Victor covering his eyes, Cricket patting his back in strained comfort, and Amanda staring at the replica like it had just flipped her off.

"She's not going on."

"Wh-what?!" Ziki asked, looking up from the floor in surprise.

"It's a lost effort," the replica said carelessly, snapping her fingers. Zency faded quickly, leaving only an indent in the wall from where she had been hit. Ziki couldn't find words, but contented herself with burying her head in her knees and curling into a ball. "She wouldn't be able to handle it, anyway."

"What's 'it'?" Amanda snapped. "Zency's been here for, what, a few days, and already you're telling us she's pointless?"

"I can't answer you right now." The replica flicked a note at Pebbles and faded off herself.

---------------------

For the rest of the day, Ziki stayed silent. She stared at the rest of the group suspiciously, green eyes darting back and forth, back and forth. Zency had been her security blanket of sorts, and now she had no idea what to do now that she was gone.

Erik and Amanda pored over the note together, this time taking it on themselves to decipher the meaning in it. It was only two simple words, but it baffled them both and tugged on the edges of Amanda's memory. She had seen them before, she was sure she had, but she couldn't place them. Was this their next clue?

Amanda showed the paper to everyone else, getting nearly the same answer every time.

Cricket looked at the paper, quirking an eyebrow. "I don't get it!" she whined.

Victor took it and read the words over and over. "I must admit, I'm not sure either."

"Oh, come now!" Shinobu took up the paper and looked at it. "It's not that-...um..."

Sephiroth glanced over Shinobu's shoulder. He waved a hand. "It's your problem now."

Pebbles had gone downstairs to eat lunch, wanting to get away from everyone and just sort everything out for a while, so the one person left was Ziki. Amanda strode over to where she sat in a corner, hugging a pillow and staring wide-eyed into space.

"Ziki?" Amanda asked gently. Ziki's head snapped to look at her, blinking in worry. Amanda offered her the paper. "Do you want to take a crack at it?"

Ziki stared at the paper like it was a bomb before tentively taking it and looking over it. Her features never relaxed as she stared at it, then handed it back to Amanda. "I don't know," she mumbled, words muffled by the pillow.

Getting the basic gist of what she was saying, Amanda nodded, hoping to look like it was no big deal as she stood. "That's fine, that's fine. I'll go ask Pebbles when she comes back up."

Ziki held up a hand. "Can you tell her I want to talk to her?" she added quietly.


	14. A Foreshadowing

"You wanted to talk to me?"

Ziki looked up from the floor to see Pebbles. The writer tossed a stray hair out of her eye and examined Ziki curiously, waiting for her to respond. It took a while before she came to her senses and remembered what it was she wanted to talk to Pebbles about.

"Yeah." She started to stand up, but instead Pebbles sat down so that she was level with her.

"So...?" She waved her hand, prompting Ziki to continue.

Before she could stop herself, Ziki started talking. Where had her self-control, her quiet nature gone? She seemed to have discarded it aside, voice becoming cold and commanding. Rapidly the words tumbled out: "Did you kill my sister?"

"What the fuck?" Pebbles laughed. "No!"

Ziki shot a glare at her. How dare she laugh about something so serious as death? "Stop laughing, ok?! It's not funny!"

"Yeah, I know, but..." Pebbles covered her mouth with her hand, obviously trying to hide a lopsided grin at Ziki's question. "In case you've gone blind, the person who killed Zency was some wannabe of you."

"You could've ordered her to kill me!"

"I didn't." She suddenly became serious, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes. "Good God, Ziki, what in the hell gives you the impression I wanted to kill your sister?"

"You...you..." Ziki waved her hands around, wanting to start over in spite of herself. This wasn't going the way she had intended to, the way that she had taken hours and hours to run through in her head, picking out words that didn't sound right and adding explanations. Her mouth was betraying her.

Her voice hitched in her throat as she stumbled, "Okay. Let me rephrase that."

"Go ahead."

"...did you ever have any plans to kill off my sister?"

"Nope." Pebbles tossed her hair and started to stare absentmindedly at the carpet near her bed. "Just your parents."

"Why?!"

"Plot." She rubbed her closed eyelids with her fingers, sighing. "Just plot. If I had my way I wouldn't have shot them down."

Ziki's eyes started to fill. She didn't understand any of this, right from the beginning. She had assumed that Zency knew what was going on and had followed her, not really taking the time to think things out. Zency had always had something clever to say, but now she was gone.

"Besides," Pebbles added, "I don't think she's dead. Just somewhere."

Ziki rubbed at her eyes furiously. "Where?"

The last person she had expected to have any idea of what was going on drew a blank and didn't try to cover it up. She stared down at her feet, thumb running back and forth along the bare skin. Her voice dropped to a low mumble.

"I don't know, Ziki."

---------------------------------

Cricket shoved the note in Pebble's hand as soon as she emerged from the stairs of the cellar. She had brought Ziki down there so they could talk in peace, and after they had finished their conversation, they ended up simply staring at the DDR dance pads.

"I wish someone had taught me how to play," Ziki said quietly, to which Pebbles responded, getting up from her seat, "One day, Zik, one day."

Now Pebbles had to push Cricket to the side in order to get out of the way of the stairs. She had given her the paper so forcefully that both had nearly gone crashing down the wooden steps.

"Read it! Read it!" Cricket chanted, bouncing up and down in anticipation as Pebbles slowly unfolded the note.

She rolled her eyes and read it aloud. "'Giants orbiting.' What the-"

"I know, I know!" Cricket fished around in her pocket and yanked out a cherry lollipop. She undid the wrapper with trembling fingers and stuck the candy in her mouth, returning the paper back to her overstuffed pocket. "Weird, huh? Do you know what it means?"

"Does anyone else?"

Wordlessly the blonde pointed to the small note, scrawled in pencil, in the corner of the paper. Pebbles squinted, trying as hard as she could to read the small, neat print.

_Pebbles-_

_None of us can figure this out. I have gone on a walk to clear my head for the moment in order to think more clearly later. Cricket should be handing you this in the meantime. Hope you know what it means._

_-Shinobu._

Pebbles snorted. "Well, that was nice of her."

Cricket was close to exploding on the spot. Pebbles ought to go faster!, she thought. She gave a great leap in the air. "Well?! What does it mean?"

Pebbles tumbled the figures around in her mind. Hasn't she seen this before? She had, she was sure of it...in a book called-

She pointed a finger at Cricket. "You know that short brown bookshelf near my desk?"

"The one in the corner?"

"Yeah, that one. Second-to-last shelf, there's a book called Mirrormask. Can you go get it for me?"

As Cricket took the stairs up two at a time, Pebbles scratched at her head, staring at the words on the paper. It didn't make sense. The next initials on the paper were H.P., not H.C. Mirrormask didn't fit in here. Was it out of order?"

_"I am your warning."_

"Jeezy-weezy, Dr. Cid," Pebbles mumbled, head flopping backwards onto the back of the couch in exhaustion. "We've got some foreshadowing here."


End file.
